A GOOD AGE: Gardens help keep Marshfield's Mary Eliot young

Mary Eliot of Marshfield, former Shady Hill School educator, has been coming to this quiet spot along the along the banks of the North River for 65 years now – since 1949. Her gardens, started by her father, are just one way she doesn't let age stop her and stays engaged in her community. She turns 90 Sept. 1.

By Sue Scheible

The Patriot Ledger, Quincy, MA

By Sue Scheible

Posted Jul. 23, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated Jul 23, 2013 at 11:13 PM

By Sue Scheible

Posted Jul. 23, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated Jul 23, 2013 at 11:13 PM

MARSHFIELD

» RELATED CONTENT

LINKS

FILES

» Social News

Mary Eliot has been coming to this quiet spot along the along the banks of the North River for 65 years now – since 1949.

She was 26, five years out of Vassar College, when her father retired from the federal government and her parents moved to Marshfield from Washington. In a bit of serendipity, they scooped up an 18th century farmhouse, barn and five acres before others even learned the coveted property was on the market.

Eliot turns 90 on Sept. 1 and the historic site, once the Rogers Shipyard, still has the same allure.

Her colorful garden beds, set in a rectangle to match the house, and gently sloping lawn give a sense of leaving time and pressure behind. In July, the deer flies can give a good bite, but the walk down Corn Hill Lane to the landing has a sense of adventure. Her house looks out over the marsh and river.

I met Eliot last week when her gardens were included on the annual garden tour of the South Shore Natural Science Center. Due to arthritis, she leaves the physical work to her assistant, Hazel McDonald, but each spring she picks out new plants and helps plan the designs.

“I love to get down in the dirt and pull the weeds and all that sort of thing,” she says. “There is something creative – certainly being next to nature. Some think of it as being next to God, I don’t go into too much of that, but there is some truth in it.”

Seated inside her screened back porch, she entertained tour-goers who could drop in to ask about this or that, especially the popular blue-colored platycodon (balloon plant).

It’s easy to see why this was never a place Eliot wished to leave for long. “It has an old-timey atmosphere and feeling of being back in the 1940s and ’50s, laid back, not sophisticated, but comfortable and just lovely,” said Linda McManus of Scituate.

She and and Evie Galanis of Abington were on the garden tour and were lingering on the lawn as Galanis added, “We could stay here all day.”

Eliot worked at the private Shady Hill School in Cambridge for 40 years, from 1949-1989, where she said she “did everything you could except be a parent,” and always summered back here, as she does now from her home at Proprietors Green in Marshfield.

At the end of the lane by Corn Hill Landing is a small garden, called Mary’s Garden, dedicated in June 2012 by the North and South Rivers Watershed Association. It honors her long commitment to preserving the waterway and features plants that grow well along the shores.

“Mary is one of our longest members (she joined in 1989) and just a great supporter,” said Samantha Woods, executive director of the organization. “She still goes out to our lectures and is not letting her age stop her. She is wonderfully social, and I think that part of her success in being so vital is she is so invested in her community.”

Page 2 of 2 - That always has been her way, since she attended the Sidwell Friends School in Washington. At Shady Hill, she started as an apprentice; taught fourth grade and classical Greece (state Treasurer Steve Grossman was a pupil); seventh grade and early American history. Whatever the subject, she became an expert, studying herself in Greece. She was also the school’s acting director and then, interim director, and spent a year as acting director of the preschool lab school at Smith College.

Known at Shady Hill for her love of the children, she was nonetheless regarded as a bit daunting, even by some parents. She retains a touch of that formality, but the smiles come, especially when she is in her garden. “I love it. It’s fun,” she says.

Once retired, she was in demand for community groups, and served as board chairman at The James Library in Norwell.

Aging? “I don’t fight it – I have kept busy,” she says.

Reach Sue Scheible at scheible@ledger.com, 617-786-7044, or The Patriot Ledger, Box 699159, Quincy 02269-9159. Read her Good Age blog on our website. Follow her on Twitter @ sues_ledger. READ MOREGood Age columns.